The Chicago Transit Board approved the award of a contract for station improvement work related to the Red Line South reconstruction project, one of the largest reconstruction projects in the Chicago Transit Authority’s (CTA) history and a multimillion-dollar investment in both Chicago’s South Side and the backbone of the CTA rail system.

The project, which begins in spring 2013, will completely rebuild the 43-year-old Red Line South — including all track, ties, ballast and drainage systems — from Cermak-Chinatown to 95th Street. The station work will renew and improve the eight stations along the project footprint, including painting and lighting, bus bridge improvements, and new roofs and canopies at some stations.

F. H. Paschen, S.N. Nielsen and Associates LLC submitted the lowest bid for the station work component of the project at $43.875 million.

Paschen met the CTA’s target of 40% Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) participation by engaging the services of 13 DBE subcontractors.

The total DBE contract dollar amount is just over $17.5 million with 92.2% going to African-American firms, 7.8% to Hispanic firms and six percent to women-owned firms.

Since announcing the project in June, the CTA has worked diligently to make sure DBE subcontractors were aware of the Red Line South project—hosting seven meet-and-greet sessions pairing potential prime contractors with more than 160 companies to ensure that prime contractors engaged with DBE firms that may qualify for and be interested in the work.

The overall estimated budget for the project, including design, construction and additional CTA service, is $425 million. The project is part of more than $1 billion in federal, state and local funds being invested in the Red Line, the system’s busiest.